CERT Graduates Number 500 — The Arlington Community Emergency Response Team program graduated its 500th resident on Saturday. CERT says this weekend’s graduating class of citizen emergency responders was their largest one yet.

More on Mala Tang — Rebecca Cooper, formerly of TBD.com, takes a look at Mala Tang, the new Chinese “hot pot” restaurant near Clarendon. Unanswered question: are there enough potential customers who are willing to sit down and learn the hot pot process — and who don’t mind their meal getting “a little messy?” [Washingtonian]

Empty Shelves at Papery — Is Papery in Clarendon merely restocking its supply of stationary products, or is it in danger of closing? The store says they’re “making way for new stock.” [Clarendon Culture]

Elementary Students Run TV Show — Arlington Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Pat Murphy’s “Snapshots” TV segment visits the televised morning announcements show run by Henry Elementary students. [AETV]


Yes, it seems that the much-ballyhooed royal wedding is local news. After all, that and a weather item regarding today’s slight risk of showers makes up the entirety of the “above the fold” portion of the Washington Post’s local news page.

So we might as well give a nod to pop culture and ask: did you watch the wedding? Bonus question for the comments: were you late to work as a result?


Arlington Independent Media’s Voice Box current affairs program will take on transportation issues tonight with guests Gabe Klein, the former director of DDOT, and Robert Thompson, also known as “Dr. Gridlock,” the Washington Post’s traffic guru.

Klein and Thompson will discuss “transportation issues in and around the D.C. metro area” and will answer viewer questions. The program will air live on Comcast channel 69 and Verizon FiOS chanel 38, starting at 7:30 p.m.

The public is invited to attend the taping. AIM asks that audience members arrive by 7:15 p.m. at their studios at 2701-C Wilson Boulevard.

If you can’t catch it live, Voice Box will re-air Tuesday at 7:30 p.m., Thursday at 6:30 p.m. and Saturday at 10:00 p.m.


The lack of a congressional mandate and a clear diplomatic policy has Virginia Sen. Jim Webb (D) questioning U.S. military involvement in Libya.

On MSNBC yesterday, Webb told host Andrea Mitchell that President Obama should have consulted congress before ordering airstrikes on Libyan forces loyal to Col. Muammar Gadhafi.

“We have not had a debate,” he said. “I know that there was some justification put into place because of concern for civilian casualties” at the hands of Gadhafi forces, “but this isn’t the way that our system is supposed to work.”

Webb argued that the U.S. does not really know much about the Libyan rebels that are benefiting from the airstrikes.

“We know we don’t like the Gadhafi regime, but we do not have a clear picture of who the opposition movement really is,” he said.

Although Britain and France have joined the U.S. in conducting the airstrikes, Webb questioned the true international support for the strikes. Brazil, Russia, India, China and Germany abstained from a U.N. Security Council vote authorizing the action, he said, adding that the Arab League has been tepid in its endorsement. Meanhwhile, Webb noted that Britain and France has a direct economic interest in Libyan oil, while the U.S. has less to gain.

“I really don’t believe that we have an obligation to get involved in every single [conflict] in that part of the world,” he said. Webb is a member of the Armed Services Committee, a former Secretary of the Navy and a Vietnam veteran.


Arlington Public Schools will hold its third annual televised singing competition Thursday night.

Four high school students will vie for the title of “Arlington Idol.” The finalists — as voted by their classmates — are Mary Shields of H-B Woodlawn, Danyele Greenfield of Wakefield HS, Abir Haronni of Washington-Lee HS and Kate Mountain of Yorktown HS. They will be joined on stage by the U.S. Army Band “Downrange,” the pop/rock contingent of the military’s music corps, who have assisted with the competition since its inception.

Four runners-up from each county high school will perform as the band’s back-up singers this year. The runners-up are: Kyra Klontz of H-B Woodlawn, Tigist Worku of Wakefield HS, Mallory McKenzie of Washington-Lee HS and Rachel Gromberg of Yorktown HS.

The show will start at 7:30 p.m. at Kenmore Middle School (200 S. Carlin Springs Road). Admission is free and open to the public, but Arlington residents can also watch a live broadcast on Comcast channel 72 and vote for their favorite vocalists via text message.

The 2009 Arlington Idol winner was Sophia Delmar of Washington-Lee. See a video of the 2009 winner’s performance after the jump.

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Update at 6:40 p.m. — Readers are reporting in the comments that the channels are not operational in all parts of the county.

Two days after we reported about a delay in Comcast’s plan to switch on additional HD channels for Arlington customers, the company has managed to get the promised channels up and running.

As of this morning, channels including CNBC HD, Comedy Central HD, BET HD and ESPNews HD were up and running. Also available was truTV HD, which is carrying a number of NCAA March Madness basketball games.

The new additions were made between channel numbers 800 and 900.

The channels were originally supposed to be available on March 15, according to a mailing sent to customers. After they missed the self-imposed deadline, Comcast told an Arlington County official that the channels were to be switched on no later than March 24.

Hat tip to @reidjoshua


Update on 3/18/11 — The channels are now available.

In a mailing that went out last month, Comcast told Arlington County customers that they would be getting “The World of More” — the company’s phrase for a slew of additional high-definition channels — on March 15.

Alas, that date has come and gone and the channels are nowhere to be seen. In fact, the only noticeable change in the past two weeks is that customers can no longer receive basic cable channels without a digital converter.

We’ve been unable to get in touch with Comcast’s PR department, but Arlington County Cable Administrator Rob Billingsley says the company has told him that it will be at least a week until the first batch of new HD channels reaches local television sets.

March 24 is now the date when channels including Comedy Central HD, BET HD and truTV HD will be switched on. The lack of truTV in HD will be a big disappointment for college basketball fans — the channel will be airing nearly a dozen NCAA March Madness games this week, including two first-round games tonight.

Other HD channels are now scheduled to come online on April 7. Those channels — including ESPNews HD, Fox Business HD and IFC HD — were originally promised on March 15, as well.

Update on 3/17/11 — A Comcast rep says all HD channels that were originally scheduled to come online on March 15 will be available no later than March 24.

According to Billingsley, the company said they were delayed in turning off the analog cable channels earlier this month. By making those channels digital-only, Comcast freed up bandwidth for the HD channels. However, no formal explanation was given for why the HD channels were still delayed.

The confusion comes at a time when Comcast’s cable monopoly in Arlington is up for review. The Comcast franchise expires on June 30, 2013, and over the weekend the county board approved a resolution that will start an official evaluation of the company’s performance.

Billingsley says the review will likely consist of public hearings and surveys that will look at Comcast’s technology, performance and customer service. Our informal poll of satisfaction with Comcast revealed strong negative opinions about the company.


(Updated at 1:20 p.m.) Once upon a time, there was a dream of local news organization that would act less as a walled castle and more as a town square. Instead of competing, it would partner. Instead of talking at, it would talk with.

This news organization would act as a hub of a local news ecosystem, a gateway through which a regional audience could be introduced to the work of independent local journalists and community blogs.

On Feb. 23, 2011, the dream died.

Rosslyn-based TBD.com is planning to lay off most of its staff, according to the Washington Business Journal. All of the site’s sports and news reporters will be let go, according to We Love DC. Among the jobs expected to be eliminated is TBD’s Arlington community reporter position, held by Rebecca A. Cooper.

Instead of reporting news, TBD will now become a niche arts and entertainment site, according to the Washington City Paper.

Two weeks ago it was revealed that TBD, which had been in operation for about six months, was to be taken over by the management of its corporate sibling, WJLA-TV (ABC 7).  WJLA.com, which currently redirects to TBD, will eventually regain its status as an independently-run news web site. Some of TBD’s staff will get jobs running WJLA.com, according to the Washington Post.

(more…)


Dozens of gaffers, grips, extras and producers were hard at work filming a Capital One Bank commercial at the corner of Columbia Pike and Monroe Street this morning.

The giant “pin” of one of the company’s signature red push pins was propped up on the sidewalk next to the bank. A lone tennis ball was glued to the top, to act as a guide for 3D artists to later inset the pin’s giant red handle.

The film crew set up their gear around 6:00 this morning, and broke most of it down by 10:00. They used The Broiler, across the street from the bank, as a base of operations.

We hear the crew was heading into D.C. to film at another Capital One bank location this afternoon. That shoot, we were told, would involve Capitals star and Arlington resident Alex Ovechkin shooting pucks from the bank’s roof.

Hat tips to Johnny K., Rebecca K. and M.E. Photo (top right) courtesy Johnny K.


American Idol headed to San Francisco last night for another round of auditions. There they found 26-year-old Emily Anne Reed, a native of Arlington who moved to the west coast to, as she puts it, spread her wings.

Reed, who was working as a barista and had just lost her house to a fire one week before the audition, impressed the judges with her unique, jazzy vocals. The judges voted 2-1 to send her to Hollywood, with Steven Tyler dissenting and saying her melody left “a lot to be desired.”

If anybody knows Emily Anne from her Arlington days, could you tell us a bit more about her in the comments?


Changes are coming to TBD.com, a Rosslyn-based local news web site that launched six months ago.

The management of TBD will be taken over by its corporate sibling, television station WJLA (ABC 7), the Washington Post reported today. Station Manager Bill Lord will now oversee TBD’s operations, according to the Post. WJLA.com, which has merely redirected to TBD.com for the past six months, will be run as a separate web site. No staffing changes are planned at TBD.

WJLA and TBD are both owned by Allbritton Communications and operated out of the Allbritton offices at 1100 Wilson Boulevard.

The change comes three months after TBD founder Jim Brady left the site, citing differences with company CEO Robert Allbritton and culture clashes with personnel at WJLA. TBD Managing Editor Paul Volpe left the site two weeks ago for the New York Times.

Keen observers of local media may have noticed that TBD’s Rebecca Cooper, who represents one-third of Arlington’s full-time reporting corps along with ARLnow.com and the Sun Gazette, has been posting fewer Arlington articles as of late — including only one so far this week. But TBD Editor-in-Chief Erik Wemple says that’s because she’s on vacation.

“No conspiracy here,” Wemple wrote via email. He also said that TBD’s Arlington coverage will continue.

An internal source tells ARLnow.com that TBD staff have attended a number of meetings over the past week or two about the direction of the site, and that some new features may be in the works.

At the same time, however, there has been a noticeable drop in the number of stories aggregated on TBD’s home page in the past month. The site has a feature that allows you to plug in a zip code and get headlines from other local web sites. At least for Arlington zip codes, that list is now only sporadically updated.

Disclosure: ARLnow.com was the first web site to join as a member of TBD’s “Community Network” of local web sites. We still maintain that relationship.

Flickr pool photo by BrianMKA


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